Sunlit Garden
by Ayatsuji
Summary: Tala doesn't know how he arrived at the academy, only that he was there. But a ring and his own confusion lead him into a world of duels, roses, and a desperate fight for Kai's freedom. :Utena fusion, TalaKai


**Free Talk**

I start school on the 28th again. I'm still horrifically busy with artwork for college. Most of my fanfic are static for either lack of will to write, no interest in it, missing co-author, co-author is lazy, or not knowing what direction it's going in. But fear not, I will, at some point, complete all the stories listed here on this account. If there is no hope of that happening, I will remove it completely. (If there is something you'd like me to try and update, please let me know in a (relatively) polite (of course, the keyword is relatively), worded-in-understandable-English PM and I will try to my best to do so. If I am unable to, I will PM/email you back with my reason—although that reason has probably already been listed in the bio (that nobody reads.)

_

_

* * *

—

(x) **Date:** 2006.08.22 - 2006.08.23  
(x) **Author:** Kuroi 

(x) **Summary:** Yuriy doesn't know how he arrived at the academy, only that he was there. But a ring and his own confusion lead him into a world of duels, roses, and a desperate fight for Kai's freedom.  
(x) **Pairing:** Yuriy/Kai  
(x) **Warnings:** I haven't seen _Bakuten Shoot Beyblade_ in its completion, and because this is a partial fusion with _Shoujo Kakumei Utena_ the characterizations will be off in areas but I will try my best to make compromises and conform the characterization to their originals. Other warnings include BL, the standard Utena-included warnings: homosexuality, absolute confusion for the reader, and incest (although this is questionable due to my split, warped casting of Beyblade characters), and the off warning of anime-verse Utena (as opposed to manga-verse), angst, and uke-Kai.

(x) **Dedicated to:** MasterFranny  
(x) Bakuten Shoot Beyblade © Takao Aoki, Toshifumi Kawase, Takeuchi Tetsuo, Takeuchi Yoshio, Hashimoto Mitsuo  
(x) Shoujo Kakumei Utena © Chiho Saito, Kunihiko Ikuhara

—NOTE—This is, as I've stated quite a few times already, a _Bakuten Shoot Beyblade_ (BB) and _Shoujo Kakumei Utena_ (SKU) crossover. Why? Because SKU is an absolutely _brilliant_ series whether in anime or manga, and is one of my most loved and recommended series in the world. However, SKU has tended to cause a severe amount of confusion among its readers/watchers, and so I would not be surprised if the storyline lost some of you in the middle. I also will assume that for the most part, most of you have not read or seen this series, as it is generally unknown/less-watched on the English side of fandom, although it has been translated for a few years now. With this in mind, I will include rather extensive author's notes after each chapter that will explain the events, the characters, and the casting so that if the reader should get confused, they will still be able to follow along quite ably. If there is something you are still confused about that I missed explaining, please let me know and I will do my best to answer your question in an email/PM reply.

* * *

— S U N L I T . G A R D E N —  
Rose 01

* * *

—

It was a warm, sunny day, Yuriy remembered. Warm, sunny, without a single cloud in the sky—Yuriy thought nothing could go wrong. 

Except that he was wearing a black and white, boy's school uniform, and supposedly attending a prestigious all-levels academy.

Tachibana Academy was a large, spacious campus filled with tall, excellently designed buildings and cleanly swept walkways. There were rose gardens around every corner and the symbol of a rose was carved onto the campus gates. As a school of good reputation, it was selective about the students it allowed in but accommodated many more students than one would have expected.

Yuriy had no idea how he ended up there.

As a boy of sixteen years, Yuriy was enrolled as a second year in the Tachibana Academy High School. He didn't know why, and he didn't know how, but he also didn't see any harm in sticking around and finding out. Plus, he was already rather popular among the young girls in the school—with his fiery red (and interestingly styled) hair and the bluest eyes anyone had seen in a long while—and if there was one thing Yuriy liked about the crowds his past blading tournaments had attracted, it was the fans that came to cheer him on. He liked being in the spotlight; always had, always would.

The chalkboards moved on their own, in this strange, unnatural place. They slid back and forth, the information chalked on them erasing themselves and being replaced with new information. Did nobody really _teach_ here? Or were the teachers just for show? Yuriy sat in the back seat, his school cap set haphazardly on his head and stared out the large, open windows to his left. Class was over, and Ivanov was one of the only ones left in the room; a few of the other students had remained behind to socialize and clean the classroom.

"Ivanov Yuriy-kun?"

Turning his head, Yuriy's eyes widened slightly in surprise before he forced himself to resume his natural, emotionless expression. He didn't say anything, but he wondered what Kai's (former) teammate was doing in the school; perhaps he knew why Yuriy was enrolled in Tachibana Academy? He opened his mouth to ask, but the blonde's smile and sudden question cut him off.

"How did you enjoy your first day of school?"

_His_ first day of school, Yuriy wondered? Mizuhara had used "your", rather than "the" in his question, and that implied that he had been attending the academy since before Yuriy had arrived there.

Yuriy had never had a reason to speak to Mizuhara—Max, his mind supplied—before, but the boy was the only one he recognized so far and the only one who might have an answer for his questions. He smiled a kind smile that wasn't so sincere, and turned on the charm—who knew if he would need it; Mizuhara had never had much reason to like him even if he was acting suspiciously friendly. "Well, I'm sure I can enjoy it with a nice boy like you around," he said smoothly, and stood up when Max gave a happy laugh and rubbed at the back of his head with a bashful look. "Do you think we can get along?" Yuriy asked, with the same, insincere smile on his face, and Mizuhara bought it all with a smile much more truthful than his own.

"I'll show you around school!" Mizuhara said cheerfully, and grabbed his hands in excitement.

The friendliness that Mizuhara was practically _exuding_ felt even more suspicious to Yuriy then, and so he suppressed the feeling and asked, "Your name is...Mizuhara...Max?"

Mizuhara practically jumped in excitement, and his grin was wide when he said, "Yes! But you can call me Max, Ivanov-kun!"

Yuriy still didn't know if Max recognized him or not—he didn't act like it—but as he nodded anyway and followed the boy as he pulled him along, he said, "Then you may call me Yuriy, Max."

—

_"Hello, everybody—! If you can hear us, listen to our voices! This is your Tachibana Academy daily noon broadcasting duo! Miguel and—"_  
_  
"—Mystel! It's turned out to be a beautiful day today; cool and sunny! If you brought your lunches, you can enjoy it outside!"_

_"Eh, maybe you shouldn't try that. You would just be inviting a capricious, passing rain."_

_"Mou, see, it's raining now...Wait a minute, the weather report never said anything about this!"_

_"The rain in my heart is sure to cloud the sky above."_

_"Did you get dumped again?"_

_"...What about me don't you like!"_

_"Ack—! So, everyone—! If you're going to scribble on your boyfriend's back while he's napping, you better make sure he doesn't have swimming class the next day!"_

—

Max skipped down a flight of stairs in a childish excitement that Yuriy almost disbelieved (how could anyone possibly be so _happy_?), while Yuriy walked a ways behind him, his hands held behind his back as he surveyed his surroundings with a calm, almost curious air. "Max," he started, getting the boy's attention with a quietly spoken word.

"Ah, yes?" Max asked, spinning around on his feet and smiling up at the red-haired boy cheerfully.

"The high school building..." Yuriy began, looking up at a large, looming structure. He was distracted, however, by the sounds of cheering and the clash of metal upon metal. "What is that?" he asked, forgetting his previous question and looking towards the spectacle before him.

At the bottom of the stairs, there was a large crowd of what looked like every single female student attending the academy watching and screaming over two figures in the center of a large courtyard.

"The fencing club," Max said cheerfully after glancing for a moment in the direction Yuriy was staring. "It's very popular among the girls; would you like to go see?"

As the two boys descended the staircase to join the crowd of ogling school girls, Yuriy watched with interest as a girl dressed in peach and a boy dressed in blue dueled each other on the green mat spread out across the courtyard. They both were exceptionally good fencers, Yuriy could tell immediately, but the girl dressed in peach was the better one by far and it wasn't long before the boy in blue had lost his footing and stumbled, allowing the girl to thrust her rapier to the boy's chest and win the duel.

"You're good," said the boy as he removed his mask to reveal a smiling face set with golden-colored eyes and framed by long, black hair tied back into a tail. "But I haven't given up yet."

The girl removed her mask in return and dark brown locks accented by goldenrod bangs tumbled down from their restraints to frame pretty green eyes. "You look better playing the piano," she said in good humor as she shifted the fencing mask in her arms and walked off the mat to a chair with the best view. The other masked fencers seemed to part in order to make a path for her and the boy, and she sat down with a pristine, straight-backed confidence that spoke of confidence and pride.

Yuriy recognized them both. "They're so popular..." he said with some amount of awe—while Rei and Julia had always had their own fan base, it had never been so large before—what had changed?

And why were they there as well—it had been surprising enough to see Max attending the academy, but Julia and Rei? Plus to the already strange appearances of people he knew from the beyblading world, there was the name of the school itself: _Tachibana_ academy. He _knew_ someone named Tachibana—or rather, he knew that _Kai_ knew someone named Tachibana.

He wondered absently if he hadn't fallen into some freak alternate universe.

"Of course, they're Julia and Rei—!" Max said with a happy sigh, clapping his hands together like many of the other girls surrounding them, and Yuriy wasn't quite sure for a moment as to what Max was referring to. "The lady with the pretty hair is Fernandez Julia-senpai. She's the captain of the fencing club and a member of the student council." While Max spoke, Yuriy's eyes didn't leave the fencing court and he watched Julia's eyes follow the fencing match before him with expert eyes. She was an excellent blader, he knew—not as good as himself or Kai, but an excellent one nonetheless; he hadn't known she fenced as well.

"Next!" he heard Julia call as two fencers from the club finished their duel—a much shorter and far less interesting duel than hers and Rei's. Two different fencers stepped up to the mat and took their positions as Yuriy returned his attention to Max's introductions.

"And the boy is Kon Rei-kun, or just Rei. He's only a first-year in high school, but he's a super genius, already taking many college courses. He's cute and popular..." Yuriy had stopped listening here as he had happened to look at the stairs above where Rei was standing—long, blue hair and the same, cocky, amused smile he hated so much...Yuriy couldn't believe that even _he_ was attending the academy—for one, he was far too old; having already graduated from college by the time he decided to teach on the beyblade world circuit.

"...but his twin sister interferes and he can't find a girl friend because of that," Max continued without stopping for breath; but Yuriy was gone by that time. "Yuriy? Yuriy? Where are you?"

The bright, beautiful sky had opened into a dark shower of rain that pelted a lone rose garden as Yuriy ran in search of the figure he had seen above the fencing platform. He didn't get any of the rain on him, though, because he ran through the hallways where the awning shielded him from the torrent while he kept his eyes on a figure leaning on a pillar in the hallway across from him. Kinomiya Hitoshi didn't move except to push himself away from the pillar and follow Yuriy's running form with his eyes as he raced through the hallways, but when the red-haired Russian finally stopped at the corridor Hitoshi had been standing in, the man was gone.

He stopped in confusion and walked slowly to the pillar Hitoshi had been leaning again, breathing shallow breaths as he looked every which way in search of his elusive target.

"It's started to rain."

Yuriy slowly turned his head to look at the calm, indifferent man that was suddenly standing next to him and said, "It'll stop soon. I hear it's a capricious, passing rain."

Hitoshi smiled—a sarcastic, amused smile—and stared out at the red roses in the rain before him. "It hasn't been long since we last met like this," he said idly as if to fill the awkward pause. "How is Kai doing? I haven't spoken to him since he left for you."

Suddenly angry, Yuriy glared out at the same roses Hitoshi stared so fondly at and snapped, "What the hell are you talking about? What is this place?" he demanded, "What the hell am I doing here?"

There was no answer for a moment, and when Hitoshi did respond, it wasn't with what Yuriy wanted to hear. "Here," he said, holding out to Yuriy a rose that had suddenly appeared in his hand, "for the one Kai thought was worth it."

The flower surprised Yuriy, but even more surprising was the ring on Hitoshi's finger. Large, white, and with the engraving of a rose in the center; the ring was eye-catching and Yuriy found himself asking about it despite thoughts otherwise. "That ring...I see, you're engaged to someone. I wonder how I didn't hear of it?"

Hitoshi didn't laugh or smile, just retracted the rose and looked at the ring with a curious amusement that almost infuriated the other boy. "This led me to the academy," he said slowly, "the mark of the rose."

It really was a capricious, passing rain, Yuriy thought later as he stood before the small, lonely rose garden in the middle of the courtyard. Hitoshi had disappeared somewhere earlier, and Yuriy hadn't bothered to go find him—he had never liked Hitoshi after all, but Hitoshi was the only one so far who had seemed to know just what was going on; unfortunately, he was also one of the least likely to tell him just what exactly that was.

The roses were covered in water droplets from the heavy shower before, and not minding the puddles that surrounded the strange, but beautiful roses growing out of the hard concrete, he knelt before the garden and just observed. "Roses...and one white rose among red..." he said quietly, as he leant forward to peer closely at the out-of-place flower. His eyes widened as the white rose, just a bud before, glowed and began to open before his eyes—it was a process of growth seemingly on fast-forward, and Yuriy held his hand before the flower as the opening widened and it began to bloom, "And this...?" The flower dropped a ring—like the one he had seen Hitoshi wearing—into his open hand before straightening again as a newly blossomed flower among others both like and unlike it.

Yuriy didn't understand what was going on, and his confusion only grew as rose petals flew around him as if falling from a place higher than he could ever reach. But when he looked up, the roses seemingly fell from nowhere and he shook his head in disbelief. He would have dismissed the petals for a figment of his imagination that was perhaps too much of a romantic for his own good, but the petals remained on the ground around him, making the small rose garden look less out of place, and he could only wonder how, not what.

Julia was on her way home (if one could call the academy dormitories home,) after school when she came across the new boy, standing at the rose garden and looking very lost and confused. She had heard much about him from some of the girls in her fencing club, but she had never really cared much for anybody except those on the student council or the members of her fencing club. Still, as a part of the student council, it was Julia's job to assist students who needed help—they were the role models of all the students in the academy, of course, and it was up to her and the others to put on a good example, even if there was no one around to see it.

"Are you lost?" she asked out of nowhere—Julia had never seen the point of easing into a conversation. She was the type of girl who went straight to the point and disliked it when other people didn't. Julia didn't know his name, didn't know what year he was in, and didn't really care—those were insignificant things she could easily find out just by asking a simple question or two, and even still she didn't think it was necessary that she waste her time with it.

Yuriy shook his head at the voice and turned to face the person who spoke. He was almost surprised that it was Julia, and wondered if she recognized him—her expression showed no sign of it, though, and he didn't really care to find out. "No, I'm not. ...Where are the roses from?"

The brunette shrugged nonchalantly at his question and looked him over silently; he held one hand behind his back—a pose that normally would have aroused suspicion as she couldn't see his other hand; but with the red-haired student, the position looked natural and rather than like he was hiding something. "Only student council members are given that information, Underclassman, but—" Julia cut her own words off as Yuriy brought his arm out from behind his back and opened his hand so that she could see what he held in his palm.

"What is this?" he asked, wondering if she could answer his questions.

There was a long silence before Julia laughed, "You have the mark of the rose and you don't even know what it is?" Her laughter was melodic, but mocking, and Yuriy did not appreciate it. She seemingly sensed his offense, and calmed herself down quickly, "Behind the school, in the forest," she said apologetically, "there is an arena. Go there, and you should be able to find the answers to your questions."

She turned and walked away, then, and Yuriy eventually gave up on trying to call his questions out after her. It was with some amount of hesitation that he looked back down at the ring he held in his hand, and slowly slipped it on the fourth finger of his left hand.

—

_"Do you know? Do you know? Have you heard the news?"_

_"There'll be another duel today, in the forest behind the school."_

_"Oh, brave hero! Brave hero who fights for his friend's sake..."_

_"But be careful, brave hero."_

_"There are rules in the forest."_

_"Do you know what they are? Do you know? Do you know? Do you know what they are?"_

—

The forest behind the school looked rather out of place, Yuriy thought to himself as he walked up the steps and onto a marble-laid path to a large set of golden gates with the school's symbol—the same rose engraved onto the ring given to him—inlaid in the metal. He reached out to push the gates open, but before he could touch the structure, it opened on its own; the gates swinging open without a sound as if he was meant to be there.

The sight that greeted him was nothing short of amazing. Before him, a waterfall parted to reveal marble steps and various stone statues of what looked to be Greek origin were revealed as the water washed away from their forms. What was most incredible of all, though, was the giant, stone statue of a rose that had risen out of the pool the waterfall had disappeared into.

Yuriy shook away his disbelief as the magnificent setting before him appeared, and he stepped coolly onto the stone platforms that led across the lake to the statue. There was a handle carved into the rose, and Yuriy reasoned simply that he should use the handle to open the door the rose obviously was.

It turned out that he needed only to grasp the handle of the statue and a single drop of water, defying all concepts of gravity or even reality—but Yuriy had seen much in his tour of the school that he no longer had much faith in it (reality,) anymore—moved to touch the rose engraving on his ring. The area was silent except for the sound of that single drop of water, and the chime that resulted—the sound of ripples being made—seemed so loud it was deafening.

And then the statue before him began to move.

It was spectacular, Yuriy thought as he stared in awe at the giant rose that lifted into the air without the sound of mechanical engineering. The gates behind it parted much like the previous set had, and Yuriy found himself walking through them without any thought. The white steps of a seemingly endless staircase spiraled around a leaning pillar before him, and he moved surely—confidently—onto the first step. It seemed to take forever yet no time at all as he climbed the stairway to heaven—for that was what it seemed like—and he wondered why he felt no exhaustion when he at long last reached the end of the road.

Perhaps it was the view before him that took his breath away.

The arena Julia had told him about was not truly an arena—not in his mind, at least—it was, instead, the largest and most beautiful rose garden he had ever seen. Most of the roses were red roses, but dotted sparsely through the garden in even distribution were roses of other colors, and Yuriy wondered who in the world had enough time to take care of them all.

He had previously been standing on the cold, white stone of the staircase, but even without his mind telling his body to move, he found himself stepping into the garden, unconsciously avoiding crushing the roses he walked among. The beauty of those thousands of roses were, if possible, even more so when viewed as a surrounding rather than as a background, and Yuriy stepped carefully through the expanses of the garden arena until he met the edge of it.

Unable to stop himself, he looked down from above and saw the rose petals scattering and slowly floating to the ground below him and he knew if he looked hard enough, he'd see that lonely little rose bush—because it wasn't a garden; not compared to this arena—he had previously been standing before. Yuriy could see the structure and layout of the school before him, from higher than he thought even a bird could fly, and it fascinated him, the brilliance of the architecture and the beauty of the buildings that made up the academy. So engrossed was he in the stunning view before him that he didn't notice the soft, muffled footsteps of someone approaching him from behind.

"Are you not afraid?" a voice said suddenly; it was a familiar voice, one that he listened to and treasured above any other. He turned, not daring to hope but hoping anyway, and froze at the person he saw standing there. "Are you not afraid, standing there?" Kai asked him with a smile that was so unfamiliar to Yuriy that he thought for sure it couldn't be the one he loved the most.

* * *

_ _

tsuzuku

* * *

—

And so it begins. Stick with me here; because it's the first chapter, I have to get a basis set up and so the notes for chapter 1 will be far more extensive than any of the notes in the chapters following. But if you're interested, or if you've even heard how wonderful Utena is, you might want to read through to get a better understanding of the story my fanfic will follow. I've tried to cut the spoilers to a minimum, but they are there, however subtly hidden. Proceed cautiously if you hate them. 

**—What _is_ Shoujo Kakumei Utena?—** Also known as _Revolutionary Girl Utena_, SKU is the infamous not-quite lesbian series about a girl with pink hair who wants to become a prince. There are roses and duels and a S/M theme flows through every single episode and it is definitely not meant for younger audiences. Maybe rated R for suggestive themes, and stuff that America isn't so accepting of. Even the yaoi-loving side of fandom doesn't always like this kind of thing, since much of it tends to be "gay only, no les". Before you run off thinking that I've turned Yuriy and Kai into girls with this fusion-crossover, I'd like to point out that if you got this far, you probably read the first chapter already and should obviously know that neither one has gone through a sex-change and I can assure you that neither one will. Be warned, and if you're able, please proceed to the next subject.

**—Shoujo Kakumei Utena; Manga, Anime, Movie?—** The question here is, which one did I use? There are severe differences in each one and it would be exceptionally confusing to explain them all to someone who has not seen the series, so I will only describe briefly what each is. The manga, while they follow primarily the same plot, goes in a different direction than the anime series/movie. I have not, unfortunately, been able to read the manga in English, and so I am not quite sure beyond summaries of what goes on inside and how it is different from the anime. The anime is, in itself, quite gorgeous and brilliant, though, so I am fine with just using that. The movie is a summative adaptation of the anime, telling all 39 episodes of story within an hour and a half of movie and doing it so beautifully that it is probably my most loved anime movie besides _Akira_.

I could not, for obvious reasons, use the manga as part of my crossover-fusion, but I did take both the anime and the movie and fuse them together. I use whatever situation from each one that fits better with my own plot twists and change them to suit my uses. The information given, however, will be uniform throughout the series and I won't try to distinguish one from another except to tell you why I did what I did and what things were supposed to represent.

**—Prince?; The Entire Base Plot Of SKU—** And what about the prince? SKU is a series based off of a fantastical idea: Utena wants to grow up to become a prince and save all the girls who are in need of help. I removed this basis for the sole reason that my Utena is no longer a girl. A boy who wants to become a prince is not nearly so interesting as a girl who wants to—especially since much of SKU has underlying, subtly hidden ideas of females being the weaker sex. With Yuriy cast as the daring Utena, I no longer had any use for the prince baseline, no matter how awesome it is/was—it also, unfortunately, plays no part in the BB part of the story—that is, the part where "Sunlit Garden" is not a true fusion, but rather a partial crossover.

**—Casting—Who Is Who?; For SKU Watchers—** I won't reveal who I've cast every character as, but I will explain who is who as I reveal their character. It's obvious, of course, that Yuriy has been cast as Tenjou Utena, the cute, popular, princely main character of the series. I chose him for the role primarily because I wanted to write about Yuriy and Kai, even if some other character might have been more suited for the role. In fact, Kai probably would have been best suited for the Utena role, except that I have obviously cast him as Anthy. Why? Well, it will become apparent later as my own plot begins to form alongside the Utena one. Aside from Kai and Yuriy, whose roles are exceptionally obvious, I've cast Max as the cheerful, loving school girl, Shinohara Wakaba—Utena's best friend. Relationship wise, I probably should have cast one of the Neo-borg as Wakaba, but not one of their personalities fit Wakaba's, and I might have used Tachibana Hiromi if she hadn't been used for the school's purpose and was a girl. As a boy has been cast as Utena, I needed another boy that was just as bright and cheerful to be cast as Wakaba. No one fit the role better than Max.

Two other relatively minor but not quite as minor as Wakaba characters would be Kon Rei and Fernandez Julia. I cast Rei as Miki, the genius piano player because he has the calm, kind personality that Miki has. There are other reasons as well, but since their situations have not yet been revealed by the story, I won't speak of them here. But here you might ask, why Fernandez Julia? Why cast _her_ as Juri? Arigasawa Juri's story in SKU is one of the most beautiful and touching ones I've ever seen. And because of that, I could not just cast anybody as Juri—for reasons yet untold, I could not cast a boy as Juri as I did with Utena and Anthy. Unfortunately, there are very few girls in this series, BB, and so I had very little choice. Julia was, quite honestly, the best choice for this role out of the female characters that had not yet been cast already.

And finally, Hitoshi. Why has Hitoshi been cast as Touga? Touga, whose stunning blue eyes and striking red hair are his trademarks; and whose smooth speech and projected kindness are adored by all the other characters—wouldn't Yuriy or even Brooklyn have been better for this part? To be truthful, I had thought about it, about making either Yuriy or Brooklyn Touga's counterpart, but in the end, with the way I cast all the characters, it could not be helped. For my plotline, Yuriy and Brooklyn fit their own roles much better than they could fit Touga's, and so I cast the next best subject: Hitoshi. It's not just appearance that has to match, of course—I needed someone who was cool and aloof and always seemed like they knew everything that was going on, even if they didn't. And Hitoshi fit that description almost perfectly.

**—Miguel and Mystel; Daily Noon Broadcasting Duo—** In SKU, there are two shadow girls that are part of the drama club and the radio talk show of Ohtori Academy. These two girls are named A-ko and B-ko (with an input from C-ko sometimes) in the series, but are called E-ko and F-ko in the movie. As my crossover-fusion is crossed-over with a fusion of the anime series and the movie (I haven't read the manga in English, so I cannot use the manga's information), I will pretty much be fusing A-ko and E-ko, and C-ko and F-ko together. Since they don't, technically, have given names, I thought about making up names to give them instead of assigning them characters from the Beyblade series. Instead, I ended up choosing two names that rhyme that weren't already cast in this story and making them A/E-ko and C/F-ko.

What is their purpose, you ask? Well, the shadow girls from SKU are there to provide oversight and narration for parts of the story; they are the ones that bring out the metaphors and the singsong, somewhat frivolous tone of the entire story. They provide a contrast in scenes and they know all about what's going on—even if they are not technically part of the story. In SKU, their voices tend to accompany shadow figures that move and do various things on a plain, yellow-gold wall. For the most part, I'll be taking A/E-ko and C/F-ko's broadcasts directly from the series/movie, but as I'm putting this all in writing, the actions won't be included in the writing and so I have to change the dialogue slightly in places in order to convey a similar feeling.

**—But What About The Crossover Part?; It's Not Just Pure Fusion, Is It?—** What do I mean by that, actually? Well, like I mentioned in the broadcasting duo section, much of this story will come directly from the anime. Scenes, dialogues...it's what makes Utena Utena. However, what makes Utena Utena does not make Beyblade Beyblade. This is only a partial fusion, it's half crossover as well. I did not just take the Beyblade characters, cast them as the Utena characters, and proceed to play out the entire series in fic-format. No, as I've said, I've already fused the anime and the movie together, so that already has taken some amount of originality. But the Beyblade part? Yes, that will come into play. The past series events (for the most part, G-Revolution) will become very important later on as Yuriy (as well as you, the reader) is still in the dark about what happened to bring him to this strange, extra-ordinary academy.

Why is Yuriy meeting random bladers all over the academy? Why do they have to introduce themselves when he should know who they are—when they should know who he is? What in the world is going on with the roses and the dueling platform? Why is he there in the first place. The majority of these questions can be answered just by knowing what SKU is about, but the rest of them depend on the plot I've worked in to tie these two worlds together as both a fusion and a crossover. Yes, the characters from Beyblade have replaced the ones from Utena, but no, I do not follow the Utena storyline faithfully—not completely, anyway. There are twists and turns that will possibly leave your mind spinning, but if you're patient and follow my explanations in these more than a little extensive notes, I think you'll do fine. These aren't here for me, after all.

_

_

* * *

**FFnet Specific Notes**

Okay, for the record, I'm writing this story the way I wrote the "Birdcage". Basically, I've written one chapter and posted it. I'll write the rest of them before the next chapter is posted, and then it will only be if there is enough interest in this fic. If there isn't enough interest, it'll still be written, but I just won't post it on FFnet. This story is written for MasterFranny anyway, and as long as she gets it, it's fine and I don't need to post it on FFnet to get it to her.

I didn't really want to add yet another unfinished story to my account, and that's why this is being done. If in fact this story does_ not_ get as much interest I would like, I'll probably take this chapter down as a whole so it isn't archived on FFnet at all. This is just a heads up, so if you like it and/or are interested in reading more, then let me know so that it's possible. Just saying.


End file.
